the longest journey begins with a single step

It’s not having what you want —it’s wanting what you’ve got.” I heard this a thousand of times.  Is this the real answer to lifelong quest for happiness? Is this the key to a satisfied life? Not quite, researchers say. In a new study I’ve seen on the net, psychologists found that “happiness is both having what you want and wanting what you have”. I agree. As humans, wanting is innate. It’s in our nature to have something to yearn for. It’s the by product of God’s gift of free will –- freedom to choose, freedom to want. We want different things in life but the common denominator is we all want something. It can be as grand as ruling the whole world or as simple as collecting seashells. Even newly born babies want something, and they cry to get it. To want, to yearn, or to desire or whatever we call it is as natural as breathing.  So if we deny ourselves of having something we want and getting it, it’s like going against every grain of our nature.

I have always had doubts with “It’s not having what you want —it’s wanting what you got”. Sorry for those people who use this as their guiding principle… but what a crap! I do not think it’s possible. Maybe this adage was made in good faith. I mean maybe its real implication is to stop people from being insatiable and to find contentment for what we have… But if this statement is to be taken as it is, I see a huge error in its sentence structure. To me it translates as “stop wanting—stop dreaming, this is your life, deal with it!” How can a person live with that? It doesn’t make sense. What really makes sense to me is “it’s having what you want and wanting what you’ve got”. The operative word there is and. I think wanting something else than what we already have is not wrong. I think what dissatisfaction is. Getting what we want is essential to us. Pursuing our dreams, our purpose is what keeps us going, makes us move forward, and gives us the driving force to live life. It’s just a matter of knowing when to stop and learning to embrace what you’ve already got.

 I don’t recall great men and women in history became great by simply wanting whey got. Can you imagine if they did? There will no discoveries, invention, technology, science, philosophy, etc…there will be no history at all.  We would be just millions of Homo sapiens with no desire but to eat and procreate… We would be as good as dead. So is that happiness? Is that a satisfied life? That is not a life at all! And as a Christian, I believe that God intended us to be this way, to want, to dream… even salvation is free, but still we have to want it first – accept it first… but that’s all a different topic. All I’m trying to say is, it’s getting what want is like our fuel, it’s what keeps us going, it’s what makes us believe that there’s more to life. But then again, we must also learn to draw a line between wanting and lusting. And that there comes “happiness is both having what you want and wanting what you have”…because to be able to want what we have, we must first have what we want…